Today our guest is Peter Watts, author of the Hugo-nominated sci-fi novel Blindsight , the Rifters trilogy, and the upcoming short story collection Beyond the Rift and a new novel titled Echopraxia. Hi Peter! Welcome to the blog. What can you tell us about your sci-fi trilogy? Not much, in the space of this interview. The first book explores the theme that we tend to build civilization on the backs of its outcasts; the second deals with the healing power of revenge; the third rubs your face in the messy consequences of the first two. Along the way we deal with the benthic ecology of hydrothermal rift vents, the application of Darwinian evolutionary principles to networked systems, and the consequences of good intentions gone bad by way of some sloppy neurotech and consequent sexual violence (which some— I am not among them— regarded as gratuitous). What is the difference between regular sci-fi and hard sci-fi? The scientific background of the reader. When I was in high school, Larry Niven wrote hard-sf. Once I learned how genes work, it became obvious that the central Known-Space conceit of a gene that codes for luck is pure fantasy. While I was writing Maelstrom, I spent a couple of pages detailing how behemoth used a 532-amin-acid listeriolysin analog to enter the host cell via receptor-mediated endocytosis. That probably sounds like "hard SF" to you; but I'm pretty sure an actual microbiologist would find the concept as handwavey and fanciful as Niven's luck-coding genes. There's a reason we call it science fiction: we make a lot of stuff up. How plausible it feels has at least as much to do with the expertise of the reader as that of the author. That's a very good point! Did you have any angst about putting vampires in space? That’s a gutsy move. Gutsy? I don't know if I'd go that far. A vampire ended up in Blindsight because of a bad decision some con organizer made years before I wrote the book. Back at the dawn of the century— right after Starfish, my first novel, came out— I attended a con at which someone assigned me to a panel on vampires. I knew nothing about vampires. I had read one Anne Rice novel. I'd seen a few episodes of Buffy and been unimpressed. I was a hard-sf writer, dammit. But here I was on this panel about vampires. So I started playing around with possible biological mechanisms to justify all those hokey traits vampires are supposed to have. When I came up with the Crucifix Glitch, I knew I was on to something. Afterwards, when I was writing Blindsight, I carefully configured each character in that story to reflect a specific aspect of consciousness— but there was this hole waiting to be filled by a character I hadn't figured out yet. And one day I happened to look to one side and see this whole vampire-retcon thing I'd been niggling away at for a few years, and on impulse tried sticking it into the empty spot in Blindsight. Surprisingly, it fit. The sheer dissonance-inducing absurdity of sticking a vampire into a hard-sf novel was pure bonus. I know I really enjoyed reading your Vampire Endnotes - it made vampires seem realistic! What about your new short story collection? Are the stories sci-fi, fantasy, horror, or a blend? This has been a pretty good year for collections; my whole short oeuvre up to last year has just come out in Poland (under the title An Antidote for Optimism), and a smaller collection is slotted for later this month in Spain (not sure of the title for that one). But Beyond the Rift is kind of a greatest-hits collection, with a custom-written four-thousand-word essay tacked on at the end. The fiction is pretty consistently science (although some of my stuff has been described as horror, that's not what I set out to write). The only outright fantasy in the book is a story called "Nimbus"— the second story I ever got published, actually— which is a kind of environmental disaster story built on the premise that clouds are controlled by malign airborne microbes which affect global weather patterns. I did no research at all for that story; it was a spontaneous brain fart inspired by some comment an ex-girlfriend made about how "alive" an approaching thunderstorm happened to look. Which made it kind of cool when, a solid decade later after the story came out, a British/Israeli team started trawling clouds looking for malign airborne microbes that might be affecting global weather patterns. I can't remember if they found any. Will we meet any familiar characters in Echopraxia? Yes. One. And you will hear, briefly, from another. Hmm, not getting too much of a sneak peek on that one, I see! Who are some of your favorite writers? They change over time. Also I don't get nearly as much chance to read for pleasure these days as I'd like, so my sample size is pretty impoverished. But to name just a few: John Brunner, Samuel Delany, China Miéville, Richard Morgan, Dave Nickle, Caitlin Sweet (CoI warning: she's my wife), and Ayn Rand. Just kidding about that last one. You had me for second there. What’s your best advice for writers? The quality of your writing doesn't have nearly as much impact on getting published as you might think. Remember that when you encounter a published story that's about half as good as the piece you've been trying unsuccessfully to sell for five years. Also, certain agents and editors may tell you that you have to "stand apart from the crowd" if you want to succeed— and further, that the way to "stand apart" is to do what everybody else is doing and join the echo chamber called Twitter. These people are idiots.I have to admit, I've seen a lot of Twitter accounts where self-promotion never takes a day off! Thank you so much for sharing some of your writing life with us! Any time. Thanks for your interest.You can get more from Peter Watts on his website, Rifters (which is soon to be updated), and his blog! He is also on Facebook.

Today our guest is J.R. Hamantaschen, author of the horror collection You Shall Never Know Security. What a great title!Hi J.R.! Welcome to the blog. Thanks for having me, so to speak.Tell us about your book! Well, it's a collection of thirteen of my short dark fiction works from over the years. The oldest story was published when I was 19, and the collection itself was released when I was 27, so, as you can imagine, there's a fair range of stories included. Personally, I don't read much fiction because I have great difficulty in investing myself emotionally in most stories. I really dislike "genre exercises," which are basically just, as the name suggests, exercises in genre for their own sake. Each story in here meant a lot to me when I wrote it. There was some idea, some emotion, some sadness or some desperation I was trying to exorcise in the writing. I'm fairly self-deprecating and shy away from self promotion, but one thing I am mildly proud of is the sequencing of the collection - the themes become layered and cumulative. The final novella, "There Must Be Lights Burning Brighter, Somewhere," is sort of the apotheosis of what I've been hinting at and suggesting throughout the whole collection. As I was checking out your writing, I kept thinking it seems to have something in common with the New Weird. How would you describe your genre? If only I read more modern fiction, perhaps I'd have a better answer for you! I was recently invited to the Necronomicon Convention in Rhode Island, and this question kept coming up, and I had to stumble through an answer. When people ask about the New Weird, I think they are talking about modern authors striving to create a feeling of the uncanny. H.P. Lovecraft, with his cosmological indifferentism, is usually the touchstone for these writers. I'm not really a fan of much "New Weird" writing, to be honest, or perhaps I've just been reading the wrong authors. I feel like Lovecraft thoroughly mined his territory. I often get lumped into H.P. Lovecraft-land, which I can understand, as I share his cosmic pessimism and his nostalgia for childhood, the fanciful, and "simpler times," and have been obviously influenced by some of his monstrous creations. (Also, many Lovecraft-centered publications have been gracious enough to review and recommend my fledgling collection). But Lovecraft used most of his human characters as ciphers to convey his larger ideas; that's not a knock against him, it's just incontrovertibly true. I find the human interior interesting, especially the depressed, maladjusted sort, and try to explore that a bit in my work.That is a heavy undertaking - who are some of your literary influences? Lovecraft, but nowadays I am more interested in Lovecraft's biography and non-fiction writings than in his fiction. In terms of more "modern" authors, I deeply admire: T.E.D. Klein ("Events at Poroth Farm," "Children of the Kingdom," "Black Man with a Horn)"; Dennis Etchison ("The Dark Country," "The Death Artist"); Harlan Ellison (too many works to count, but particularly "The Whimper of Whipped Dogs" and his general persona); Clive Barker ("In the Hills, the Cities," "Confessions of a Pornographer's Shroud"); Theodore Sturgeon ("Bright Segment"); Robert Silverberg ("Dying Inside"); Wilum Pugmire (everything, and his inspiration as a marvelous human being);A very eclectic mix! I recognize some of those names (Ellison is amazing), but I can't wait to explore the authors that are new to me! I noticed quite a few lists and reviews on Goodreads indicate that your book is pretty scary. How do you create suspense and horror in your work? I'm a little surprised when I get emails from readers telling me that a certain story "scared" or "disturbed" them. I never really write with the goal of "scaring" or "disturbing" anyone. I just write stories that I hope are philosophically and internally consistent. Perhaps my sensibilities and perspectives are skewed and that just results in uncompromising, bleak stories, which some people find disturbing. I also try and be even-handed in my presentation of characters, so the reader can hopefully find something to empathize with in each character, which I suppose may make things suspenseful in that you don't want anything bad to happen to them. Real scientific advice, as you can see. Scientific or not, that is great - I think personal and offbeat advice is more inspirational than the advice we've heard a thousand times! On that note, what is your best advice for writers? The standard mantra is "keep writing," but I don't really believe that. I've helped ghost edit a couple of collections, and I really do see the same stories and tropes and genre exercises, over and over and over again. So my advice would be try and think up an original story that you are passionate about, that resonates with you in some way, rather than create the 1,500th "buried alive" story. But, then again, that may explain why my output is so few and far between.Are you working on any new books at the moment, or are you in the musing and percolating stage? I am v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y putting together the next collection. I'd say I am about 50% done. That's one of the problems of having T.E.D. Klein as a literary idol. I feel no rush, and get terrible writer's malaise and general world weariness.I look forward to hearing more about it when you're nearing the finish line! Thank you so much for joining us on the Freelance and Fiction blog!No problem, thanks for having me.

Didn't get enough of J.R.'s POV? I don't maintain a website or any social media accounts. Ironically, I do greatly enjoy communicating with fans; I just prefer it on a one-to-one basis. My email address is jrtaschen@gmail.com. Readers and the curious are free to email me. And I also maintain a GoodReads account, if that counts as social media.Support Freelance and Fiction - share this blog! If you want a paperback or Kindle